


I'll wander mazily over all the earth

by EvaBelmort



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Post-Episode: s03e07 Digestivo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-18
Updated: 2016-10-18
Packaged: 2018-08-23 05:49:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8316238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EvaBelmort/pseuds/EvaBelmort
Summary: In the kerfuffle caused by a zombie virus taking over half the US, Hannibal Lecter escapes from the BSHCI and decides to go see what Will Graham's new home looks like. He's not expecting to actually find Will there.





	

**Author's Note:**

> For day 18 of the [Hannictober prompt calendar](http://the-winnowing-wind.tumblr.com/post/150969260494/hannictober-2016-creative-calendar), 'Zombies'.  
> 

The sun was halfway below the horizon, stretching the shadows out into fantastic shapes, and Hannibal was beginning to fear that he would never find the house. 

He had incapacitated all of his faster pursuers, but he was weary now where they were ceaseless and untiring. The darkness would render him thoroughly lost, and as he stumbled blindly they would find him, drag him down and tear him apart, and he would die alone, probably only half a mile from Will's home. 

It sounded like a particularly melodramatic opera. He hoped they would get a decent tenor for his lengthy death scene. He admitted to himself that he might be becoming delirious from lack of rest and food. 

Several of the shadows detached themselves from the trees and slunk into the road in front of him, growling, and Hannibal staggered to a halt. He probably looked more dead than alive himself by this point, he noted absently, but surely a dog would be able to tell the difference. 

A thought surfaced, sluggish and unwelcome: Will would not have left his dogs behind if he were in any shape to protest. 

He pushed it down. It was always possible that these were not Will's dogs, or that Will had been elsewhere when the quarantine was declared and had been unable to return for them. 

Closer examination proved the first possibility incorrect. Hannibal blinked, and then said tentatively, voice scratchy from disuse, "Winston, isn't it? Good boy."

The dog on the left stopped growling and cocked its head, then padded towards him curiously. Hannibal extended a hand for it to sniff, and the other dogs quieted as well. 

"I should probably be surprised," Will said flatly, stepping out of the shadow of the trees to join his dogs, "but somehow I'm not."

Hannibal just stared, wondering absently if he was beginning to hallucinate. He looked just as Hannibal remembered him, pale and a little underweight, though his hair was longer now, messy curls hanging over his forehead and obscuring the lenses of his glasses. "Will. What are you doing here?"

"What am _I_ doing here?" Will dragged a hand through his hair, dislodging a stray leaf. He opened his mouth again, closed it, and then cocked his head to one side and considered Hannibal thoughtfully, taking in his uneven posture and the heavy stick he was using more as a cane than a weapon. Finally he said, bewildered but certain, "You came all the way from Baltimore to die in my house."

Hannibal smiled at him. "My dear Will. I have missed you terribly."

Will swallowed. "How did you know where I live?"

"I found your address in Frederick Chilton's office before I left the hospital." Hannibal had to close his eyes against the immediacy of the memory, the thudding of the rabid creatures against the door as he carefully flipped through the filing cabinet, thankful that Chilton had kept hard copy and not relied on the now-useless computers.

"Why, though?" Will asked, voice dragging him back to the present. "If you didn't actually expect to find me here, why not get out of the quarantine zone?"

"I could have reached the border without difficulty," Hannibal agreed, "but I expect they have stringent identity checks and rather harsher methods of dealing with those society deems unacceptable."

"No prisons and state hospitals in the new world," Will murmured. "No use for extra mouths to feed, if they can't be trusted to work for their keep."

"No state to pay for the hospitals, either," Hannibal agreed wryly. "I believe the government has gone all to pieces these days."

"Yeah, last I heard before they stopped broadcasting anything but emergency transmission was that most of the states were closing borders and basically seceding." He paused. "If we're going to make small talk, you might as well come up to the house."

"Thank you," Hannibal said, starting forward again. His limp had not been improved by the pause, and regaining his momentum was difficult. The sun had dropped below the horizon by the time he reached Will's home. There were steps up to the porch; he halted, exhausted, and was considering the logistics of bracing himself with his stick when a hand caught his upper arm. 

He flinched away but it was just Will, gloved fingers closing tightly around his arm and hauling him up the steps, releasing him as soon as he steadied. He smelled of seawater and woodsmoke and dogs, leather and metal and blood. No cordite despite the rifle slung across his shoulder; likely he didn't use it often. He gestured Hannibal towards a wooden bench, sidled around him and into the house. 

Hannibal carefully lowered his aching body onto the seat and waited. Will reappeared a few minutes later with a glass full of brown liquid and a bowl of some sort of dried meat. He set them down on a small table by Hannibal's elbow, and said, "Iced tea and fish jerky. I don't have anything simpler. Eat slowly if you haven't for a while." 

Hannibal nodded. "I am aware. I had water left, though food was more difficult."

Will's mouth twitched up at the corner. "Do zombies count as rude?"

"I don't believe they are capable of learning manners, but I wouldn't care to eat them in any case."

Will made a humming sound of agreement, but his attention was half on the path from which they had come. Abruptly he unslung the rifle from his shoulder, setting it by Hannibal's knee. "I'm going to go check the path. Use that if you have to."

Hannibal frowned up at him. "If you intend to go looking for uninvited guests, shouldn't you take it with you?"

Will was already walking away. "I'll be fine. You don't look like you're in any shape to run for your life."

Hannibal stared after him. Having resigned himself to dying in a place with nothing but echoes of Will, Hannibal had serendipitously found Will himself, and the thought of losing him again so soon was terrifying. "Will," he said desperately. "Will, please."

Will stopped and trotted back up the steps to him, asking, "What's wrong? Are you injured?"

Hannibal swallowed hard. So simple, to call out and have him listen, to look at him with concern. He gazed up at Will, and he knew his face was far too open as he murmured, "Don't go far off, not even for a day..."

"Are you serious?" Will muttered incredulously. "Look, I'll be back in half an hour at the most. The dogs are staying, I promise you'll be safe here."

"It was not my safety I was concerned for, Will. You should at least take the gun." Will was turning away again, though, and Hannibal said urgently, "Will!"

Will stopped again, and then he sighed. "You didn't expect to find me here, because nobody in their right mind would still be living in their house in the quarantine zone, right?"

"Obviously. I read the news; Florida had one of the first outbreaks, did it not? Before the general evacuations were started. I hoped you had survived, of course, but I did not expect to find you _living_ in your house. I thought- Alana told me you had married. I pictured you in a camp somewhere, with your new family." He smiled wryly. "It was both a torment and a comfort."

Will said quietly, "They made it to the evacuation point. I didn't."

"That was months ago, surely you could have traveled to the border by now. The roads are clear enough if you stay out of major population centers; I drove most of the way here with little difficulty." 

"You're missing the point, Hannibal. I've got less chance of getting through the border than you do." He slid his glasses up onto the top of his head, pushing his hair up with them, and Hannibal felt his blood run cold. Will's eyes were sickly yellow, veined with black, _infected_. 

Hannibal stared up at him numbly, lost for words. After several minutes of utterly failing to lunge at Hannibal and rip his face off with his teeth the way he should have, Will said, "So, I'm going to go check the path. Like I said, I'll be fine. I promise not to be any more infected when I get back than I am now, though if it really bothers you, there's always the gun."

He turned away and loped down the stairs and off into the night. He hadn't even taken a light, Hannibal thought dazedly. His brain seemed to have stalled; perhaps this was was what going into shock felt like. 

Gradually, a thought surfaced: if he had been asked to choose the manner of his death, being devoured by Will Graham would very likely have been his first choice. 

Hannibal picked up a piece of fish and began to eat. It was salty, tough, and the best thing he had eaten in weeks. The dogs came up and arrayed themselves about his feet, staring into the darkness in the direction Will had gone, and together they and Hannibal waited for him to return. 

**Author's Note:**

> And everything was beautiful. The end. This may or may not involve Hannibal getting eaten, depending on what you're into.  
> (I like to picture infected Will building Hannibal a house and a heavy-duty perimeter fence and then bringing him food and books and maybe a harpsichord, while accumulating a pack of feral dogs.)  
> Title is from Pablo Neruda's 'Don't go far off' because Hannibal is a sap.


End file.
